VAUGHN — When she saw the “Noel Tree” at the bottom of the hillside near the Manchester exit earlier this week, Betty Remsh was heartbroken.

Her mother, Alice Filger, died in Texas in July 1997. Every time she drove into Great Falls, Remsh saw the solitary juniper growing near Interstate 15 and thought of her mom, who had been so far away and alone.

That December, she decided to honor her mother by decorating the lonely tree.

“I was the first one to decorate that tree,” she said. “I did it for years and years until I got too old to climb the hill. It was like my mother’s tree.”

Remsh said she’s glad the tree, which was cut down Monday, was an inspiration to others.

In recent years, friends of Conrad teacher Carol Mielke took up the cause of decorating the tree, in Mielke’s honor. She said before she died from cancer that someone must love the tree because it was decorated every year for Christmas.

A contractor chopped down the tree, not realizing it was out of the clear zone for upcoming construction and meant to be saved.

Dean Rehbein of Riverside Contracting out of Missoula said his office has received many angry calls. He said there was no malice involved in cutting down the tree, just a mistake.

Rehbein helped scout a place to plant the new tree, and he has offered to pay for the replacement, which Montana Highway Patrol Trooper Geoff Groshelle is arranging with Forde Nursery, and to water the new tree.

Rehbein said he’s sorry to have caused pain and distress. He said he understands grieving, having lost his mother to cancer less than a year ago.